Bells of San Angelo

To all of my learned comrades that posted comments insulting the late, great Roy Rogers & Dale Evans, I say from the bottom of my pea-picking, reminiscing-good old days heart, PPPPPPTTTTTTTTTTTT!!!!!!!!!!!!! LOL! I honestly do realize that the color quality isn't exactly top shelf, most of the acting is sub-par & the plots are tissue paper transparent, but who gives a horses saddle bag? I love each and every dusty one of them. And this includes the 50s TV show with sidekick Pat Brady and Nellie Belle the jeep. Yes, Gaby Hayes is the best sidekick ever! I grew up watching R.R. He brought to the youth of my time, "truth, justice & the American way"! I stole that quote, by the way. It brings me back to my childhood, which I guess was worse than these movies were. Maybe that is why I enjoyed them so much. PapaLarry H

It's been years since I've saw several number of Roy R.'s movies made in the late 40's and 50's, when they were made in color, and got this lately to see again. It always has bothered my acceptance to suspend reality to believe that practices of the pioneer days of the old west was continued, as related in the plots as still practiced in the 1940's: having buses and modern autos involved and yet chasing around on horses shooting at each other. In other words, mixing the to time period's just didn't fit and somewhat ruined some of it all for me. It made it slightly "hokey(?)" At least this movie restrained from using certain elements in the plot, which therefore made it barely feasible that all this possibly could have happened in the more modern times. Overall, I liked it and when over, I felt rather "uplifted" partially because of the good songs it contained.

I've never been a fan of Roy's, even while I watched his 1950s TV

show as a kid. I wanted to buy one RR movie, just to see if I had

changed my mind about his films. I picked this one because a

couple of sources had stated that this was his best film, & was

"tougher" than most of his films. I don't like songs with my

westerns, so of course there was far too much music for my taste

here (I lost count at seven). The comedy, supplied by Andy Devine,

was pretty good (& actually quite funny near the end of the film), a

big improvement over Smiley Burnett, but nowhere near as good

as Gabby Hayes. Dale was OK as the heroine, & better than I

thought she would be, a better actor than her husband. Indeed,

there were a couple of very gritty fight scenes where RR took a

beating (& surprisingly, this was acknowledged in later scenes

where he was seen with bruises). But overall, not an exciting

experience for me. The plot was weak & the music disconnected

what little action there was. For the sake of comparison, I'm going

to try a very small dose of Gene Autry before going back to the

greatest of all cowboy stars, William Boyd!

This is one of the last good Roy Rogers films, before they started recycling stories and churning them out a mile a minute. The plot is interesting and keeps you interested. The film isn't too long (about 1h20) and doesn't drag at all. The songs aren't too bad, and the absolutely *adorable* Dale Evans has lots of screen time;) Andy Devine was amusing as the sheriff, much more amusing than many of the later comic relief sidekicks, and Roy Rogers was at his best, in voice and in character.

Overall: One of the few colour Rogers films worth seeing; not the best of them, but most certainly nowhere near the worst (though I'm not much of a fan of the genre;). Entertaining, and worth seeing at least once. And, of course, Andy might be Devine , but Dale Evans is *divine*!!;) 7/10.

The usual, routine, singing cowboy stuff from Roy Rogers as he is sent to investigate some shenanigans at a ranch on the US/Mexican border. The film really belongs to Andy Devine as "Sheriff Cookie"; the enthusiastic, if not desperately competent local sheriff who alongside trashy-journalist "Lee Madison" (Dale Evans) has to help Rogers get to the bottom of it all. Fritz Lieber adds a wee bit of weight to the proceedings, and if you like songs with your westerns then this is no better or worse than the norm. The story is far, far too thin for 80 minutes though, an hour would have easily sufficed.